Payton Turns Up Volume, Intensity

Restrained for so long the Lakers had begun to believe he had mellowed, Gary Payton had a practice Friday afternoon they will remember.

Inspired during a three-on-three drill by a few verbal jousts from Kobe Bryant, Payton, the renowned talker, filled the El Segundo gym with bluster, most of it directed at Bryant, but leaving plenty to go around.

According to witnesses, Bryant started it on defense, declaring that no one would score on his unit, and he kept at it until Payton snapped.

As teammates wondered how far the teasing between Bryant and Payton would go, Payton, according to one player, shouted, “I ain’t going nowhere! I’m right here for the next two weeks!” No one was really sure what that meant. Payton continued his commentary until practice ended.

Mostly, Payton’s act brought smiles and sideways glances, and afterward Payton joked easily with his teammates as practice broke up.

Payton’s first -- and perhaps only -- season in Los Angeles has been a difficult adjustment, and he has at times been withdrawn. He has one of the critical defensive matchups for the Lakers against the Detroit Pistons in Chauncey Billups, and Coach Phil Jackson and others hope Payton’s awakening meant he was bracing for that challenge.

“What Gary is feeling,” Derek Fisher guessed, “is you get tired of that week in between.”

By the time Game 1 begins Sunday night at Staples Center, the Lakers will have had most of six days off.

“We needed it,” Fisher said. “Not necessarily from him, but from someone who could provide it.”

Bryant and Payton, Fisher said, were “bringing that intensity back up to, ‘This is the Finals.’ ”

“I was glad to see him get fired up,” Bryant said. “He plays at his best when he gets going like that.... He’s at his best when he’s extremely dynamic.”

Not to mention loud.

“He was wild,” Jackson said with a grin during his news conference in a room off the gym. “Could you hear him in here?”

*

Two days before the Finals, Karl Malone and Fisher were back on the practice floor, their jerseys drenched with sweat by the time media were allowed into the gym early Friday afternoon.

Malone had his swollen right knee drained Tuesday, a day after the conclusion of the Western Conference finals. Fisher sprained his knee in Game 5 of the conference finals and was a game-time decision in the series clincher, in which he played 27 minutes.

Jackson ran the Lakers through an up-and-down practice, highlighted by the ability of Malone and Fisher to participate in most activities, heightened by the full-throated commentary by Payton.

Devean George, who has a sore left knee, also practiced. Rick Fox, still bothered by pain in his neck and right shoulder, had further tests Friday to determine the cause.

*

The Lakers are doing wonders for television ratings, but what about your 401(k)?

According to CNN, the New York Stock Exchange suffered losses in every year of the Laker three-peat, but gained in the 11 years before it and in the year after it.